Its newfound notoriety includes a January sighting on Top Chef , when a contestant made a sausage slider encased in a Pretzilla hot dog bun. There was also lots of unsolicited media coverage in November in several New York City publications, which featured Pretzilla's core product as the poster bun for the beef or lamb burger at Tetsu, a new restaurant opened by sushi chef Masa Takayama. I knew instantly [the bun] was ours. Once Miller confirmed with the restaurant that it was, in fact, using Pretzilla for its burgers — the chefs probably found Pretzilla at a nearby Whole Foods, which has carried the brand for several years — he struck a deal to ship buns weekly to Tetsu in January.
A contract with one urban eatery might not be enough to lift Pretzilla to a household name, but Miller is hoping that love from some high-profile foodies underscores what the rest of the nation will feel for his product once they know about it. In fact, Miller has so much faith in his pretzel bun that he's betting his family business on it.
As of January, Miller Baking, which was founded in and bought by the current owner's family in , discontinued operating the way it had for nine decades — baking, selling and distributing different bread products daily to Milwaukee area restaurants and stores.
Today the company is solely focused on baking and marketing its four core pretzel bread variations: burger buns, mini buns, pretzel bites and sausage buns.
But many business owners, unlike Miller, are still hesitant to invest in labor. Miller said for him it's not government policy that has bred confidence and has encouraged him to hire 30 more workers: "My team and I have worked so hard to try and make Pretzilla a household name across the country. The growth that we have made over the last 12 months gave me the confidence to go all in on Pretzilla. Miller is knocking on the doors some days, literally of national grocery chains.
Whole Foods, now owned by Amazon , has sold Pretzilla since , when it launched the brand in its Chicago stores; today the chain sells its buns nationwide. Pretzilla sells in Wegmans and is in talks with other big grocers, and in January, Costco started selling count tubs of Pretzilla's pretzel bites in its Northeast stores.
Today Turner is the president of Whole Foods' southern region. Miller is also planning a huge sales and marketing push this year to convince consumers that high-quality pretzel buns "are not a specialty, they're for every day," he said.
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Filed under: AM Intel News. Pocket Flipboard Email. Highland Baking Co. And quite simply, that translates into breads with more character. Some of the dough produced here is bound for Labriola's Cafe in Oak Brook, where they use it for sandwiches, salads and even pizzas.
He loves the idea of European bread culture, where you get a loaf or a baguette every day. While that lifestyle might not make sense in Chicago, he thinks there's always room for high quality.
Little bit of pain, but a lot of pleasure," said Labriola. The things that bring Labriola the most pleasure these days are pretzels; actually, pretzel bread. His company is leading the pack in this new category, and he's got one German machine dedicated to it. He just wants to make sure the quality stays consistent, as his business continues to grow.
We're just trying to have an artisan bakery that's highly efficient," he said. If you see pretzel bread in the form of croissants, hamburger buns and dinner rolls, chances are very good they're coming from that bakery in Alsip.
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